Usui Sensei's Original Reiki Handbook

Excerpt from the Reiki Ryoho Hikkei
translated by Hyakuten Inamoto

Editor's note: The following is a translation of one section from the Reiki workbook that Usui sensei gave to his Reiki students. Reiki Ryoho Hikkei is translated to mean Reiki Healing Art Handbook. The section that follows is the Kokai Denju Setsumei, a questions and answer session about Reiki with the answers coming from Usui sensei and the questions coming from his students in the Usui Reiki Ryoho Gakkai. The remaining two sections of the workbook, Ryoho Shishin, guidelines for treatment, and Meiji Tenno Gyosei, the Emperor Meiji’s poems, may be included in a future issue of the magazine.

Explanation of Open Teaching
From olden days till now, when one created or discovered an original and mystic teaching, he tended only to teach it to his own children, making the teaching a privilege of the family and claiming that the contents of the teaching should be kept confidential within the family, so as to scheme for financial security of one’s posterity. That can be said to be an outdated custom of the last century. It is absolutely not acceptable to privately monopolize a teaching in modern times when co-existence and co-prosperity of humanity underlie happiness and also when social development is desired.

My Usui Reiki Ryoho (healing art) is original, never before explored, and incomparable in the world. Therefore, it is to be made available for the good of humankind, so that anyone may be blessed with this heavenly gift, that the soul and body may be as one, and heaven-sent well-being may be realized in one’s life. Because my Reiki Ryoho is a unique and original art of healing based on the healing power of the universe, a person first becomes healthy and then soundness of thought and the joys of life are enhanced.

The reason I venture to teach openly, at a time like today when improvement and reconstruction of our lives within and without is essential, is to save all fellow countrymen from troubled minds and from sickness and diseases.

Q.) What is Usui Reiki Ryoho? 
A.) Receiving with profound awe and reverence the teachings of the Emperor Meiji, achieving our Principles, and intending to train and develop the mind and body. First, the mind should be healed, and secondly the physical body be made healthy so as to walk on the right path of humanity. If the mind is healthy, conforming to a path of integrity, then the body becomes sturdy of its own accord.

The mission of Usui Reiki Ryoho is to enhance mutual well-being for oneself and others, on the one hand, by fulfilling a peaceful and joyful life mentally and physically and, on the other, by healing the sick.

Q.) Is Usui Reiki Ryoho the same as hypnotism, the art of mental healing with Ki-ai, faith healing, and the like, just with a different name?
A.) No, it is not the same as these other techniques. It is the art of healing the mind and body, which I have realized as a mystic after many years of hard and difficult training.

Q.) Then, is it the art of a spiritual healing? 
A.) Yes, it can be called the art of a spiritual healing, however, it can also be called the art of a physical healing. The reason for it is that any part of the physical body of a practitioner may radiate the energy and light, particularly from the eyes, mouth, and hands. Therefore, by means of gazing at for a few minutes, or blowing on, or stroking the affected part, toothache, colic, stomach ache, neuralgia, breast tumor, bruises, cuts, burns, and other swellings and pains can quickly be relieved and be gone. However, chronic diseases are not easy to cure. Several treatments are required; yet even a chronic disease becomes better with one treatment.

There is fact beyond fiction. I wonder how modern medicine can explain this kind of phenomena. If you actually see the fact, you will be sure to acknowledge it. Even those who play around with sophistry cannot ignore the fact.

Q.) Does one need to believe in Usui Reiki Ryoho so that an illness can be cured? 
A.) No, unlike psychological therapy, hypnotism, and other mental healing modalities, no consent nor esteem is required, for not a single suggestion is given. Moreover, it matters little whether you may doubt, avoid, and deny that. For instance, there is a positive effect on those who lack consciousness, such as infants and/or seriously ill patients. Barely one out of ten people trust and esteem my art of healing before they experience it the first time. Most people come to trust suddenly after having received treatment once and acknowledged its effect.

Q.) Can any disease be cured by Usui Reiki Ryoho? 
A.) Any disease, mental or organic, can be cured.

Q.) Does Usui Reiki Ryoho cure diseases only? 
A.) No, not only cure diseases of a physical body but also mental illnesses , i.e., anguish, weakness, cowardice, vacillation, nervousness, and other bad habits can be cured. And emphasis is placed on healing others with god-like or Buddha-like mind, and happiness can be mutually shared with other people.

Q.) Why and how does Usui Reiki Ryoho work? 
A.) I have not been taught this art of healing by anyone under the heavens, nor have I studied in order to obtain this mysterious ability to heal. I accidentally realized that I was given this mysterious healing ability when I felt the great power and was inspired by the mystery during a period of fasting. Therefore, even as the founder, I find it difficult to give a sure explanation. Scientists and intellectuals have been eagerly researching and consider it difficult to confirm with modern science, yet the time will surely come when science can prove it.

This is an excerpt from an article in the Summer 2006 issue of Reiki News Magazine.